Gathering the reins of the mare and the mule to lead them, Annabelle fell into step beside Harriet.
The wide streets were dusty and the warm, early summer air was exceedingly damp, yet she felt a sense of relief, of freedom, that reminded her of her carefree childhood.
She could not yet say that New Echota felt like home because everything was so unfamiliar. But the lightness to her step and good cheer in her heart at that moment were such unexpected blessings they brought a lump to her throat and an unshed tear to her eye.
* * *
A wizened old neighbor lady of Johnny’s late grandmother had stepped in to comfort him when she had seen him racing home.
By the time Charles arrived, she and the boy were sitting in companionable silence on the porch of his grandmother’s small cabin.
Johnny wasn’t crying. Stoic as ever, he was merely rocking back and forth rhythmically, as if in a trance.
Recognizing Charles, the elderly woman arose and pulled a shawl tighter around her thin shoulders.
He caught her eyes and mouthed, “Thank you.”
Nodding, she walked away.
The mournful child acknowledged neither her departure nor the arrival of the man with whom he had spent the past month and a half.
Wordlessly, Charles took up a place beside Johnny, sat and waited. When the boy was ready, he would speak. Until then, it was best to merely let their hearts join in shared bereavement.
Minutes ticked by. Charles didn’t move. The orange sun rested low in the western sky and was about to slide below the horizon. Streaks of pink and brighter bands of golden light radiated through clouds that were dusted across the heavens like wisps of drifting fog.
Then it began, starting as a muffled moan before rising into a keening cry the likes of which he had not heard since the passing of his own father. Johnny was not weeping. Instead, he was struggling to inhale while body and soul gave voice to his anguish.
Charles reached out, put his arm around the boy’s shoulders. Then gave a slight tug to urge him closer for comfort.
Instead of the resistance he had anticipated, Johnny threw himself at Charles and began to sob.
The man held him close, gently rubbed his back and prayed that the boy would accept the offer he was about to make. Because if he did not, there was a fair chance the chiefs would vote to send him back to Eaton’s, regardless of the situation there.
“Hush,” Charles whispered. “I know it’s hard. Death always is. Your lisi was a Christian. You will see her again one day, in Heaven.”
“I want to see her now,” the child lamented.
“I know.” Charles continued to rub his back through his jacket until his breathing began to even out. “You will come with me. I will look after you the way any good uncle would. You can become my son.”
Johnny looked up through swimming eyes. “Your son?”
“Yes.” He smiled benevolently. “It would be an honor to claim you as my own.”
“But...what about her? When will she leave?”
“Annabelle?” He gave the boy an affectionate squeeze. “I’m hoping she will agree to be married in a Cherokee ceremony and stay with us always.”
To Charles’s dismay the child gasped, pulled away from him, ran down the porch steps and disappeared into the twilight like a frightened deer escaping a hunter.
* * *
The Boudinot home was far larger than Annabelle had expected. Not only was it two stories tall and at least forty-by-sixty-feet deep and wide, it had framed, glass windowpanes and two chimneys.
Entering the house after turning the animals over to the care of one of the Boudinot servants, Annabelle was in awe. The polished parlor floor was covered by bright Persian rugs and the room was filled with intricately carved mahogany furniture. All the place lacked to make it as fine as the sitting room at the Eaton mansion was a piano, vases of fresh flowers, and perhaps a few more crocheted lace doilies on the backs of the chairs and the tabletops.
She clasped her hands together and sighed. “Oh, my. What a lovely home you have. I never dreamed I’d find such sophistication so far from Washington City.” Realizing that her comment might sound disparaging, she quickly added, “No offense intended.”
Harriet laughed. “I understand perfectly. I reacted with disbelief when I first came here, too.”
“You have so many nice things.”
“Thank you. We order clothing, groceries, tea, paper and ink from Boston, or purchase it at the mercantile down the street. Most everything goes by steamship to Augusta and is then shipped overland. Other necessities like sugar and molasses come directly from Augusta—or sometimes Knoxville.” She chuckled. “I have no problem getting whatever I need, as long as I plan ahead.”
“I can’t imagine having to consider all that.” Annabelle averted her gaze as she confessed, “I have very little practical experience in such things.”
“You’ll learn. Managing a household is not as difficult as we women let our men think it is.”
She gestured at a red brocade settee with scrolling across the back and delicate, arched legs. “Please. Make yourself at home.”
Annabelle hesitated. “I would really rather change first and wash, if you don’t mind. I wonder, might you have an old dress I can borrow while my traveling clothes are laundered? I was able to bring very little with me when I left Washington City with Mr. McDonald and the boy.”
“Of course.” She led the way to a staircase and started to climb. “I’ll show you to your room and have one of the maids bring you a bathing tub and fill it. You can give your soiled garments to her and she’ll see to them.”
“I noticed that you had servants in the stable. You have them inside, too?”
Harriet nodded. “A few.”
“Are they slaves?” Annabelle asked. “I didn’t expect that here.”
“Some are. Some are free. My cook, Fiona, is indentured from Ireland. She’s a gem. We bought her debt when we were in Boston and brought her with us.”
“What will you do when she’s worked it off?”
“Hire her for a fair wage, I hope,” Harriet said. “I don’t know what I would do without her.” She shook her head and sighed noisily. “As for the others, we do what we can to educate and prepare them. If the time comes when we all have to emigrate, we want our servants to be able to fend for themselves.”
“Emigrate?” Coming to the upstairs room her hostess indicated, Annabelle paused in the doorway.
“Did Charles not tell you? That was one of the reasons he and the others were in Washington trying to obtain an audience with the president. The state of Georgia has declared that come June 1 of this year, all Cherokee lands belong to the state and our laws and customs are null and void.”
“Oh, no! Why would they do such a thing?”
“It is a long and complicated story,” Harriet told her. “Why don’t you relax and take care of your ablutions now. We can talk more later.”
“All right.” Smiling slightly, Annabelle undid the wrinkled, fraying ribbons of her small bonnet. “I see you don’t cover your hair as was the custom where I come from. I will be delighted to follow your example.”
“Nor do I wear a corset,” Harriet said with a giggle and a blush. “Elias was shocked at first but I see no reason to torture myself unnecessarily.”
“Oh, my! Truly?” Annabelle’s eyes widened. “If I had thought of being so bold, I know I would have had a much more pleasant trip.”
“Consider this a revelation, then. Many of us here have foresworn tight laces for the sake of our own comfort and the health of our babies.”
“Dear me.” She knew her cheeks were flaming but hoped the high color was masked somewhat by the sun’s previous effects on her fair skin.
The other woman’s eyebrows
arched. “Forgive me for being so bold. I was given to understand that you and Charles were wed.”
“We—we are. It’s just...”
“Ah. I think I see. The marriage is one in name only?”
“For traveling purposes,” Annabelle said, wondering why she felt so embarrassed. Surely hers was not the first marriage of convenience the other woman had encountered. Would she have been accepted so readily by the Boudinots if she had traveled with Charles and the boy as a single lady? She strongly doubted it. Such things were simply not done by gentlewomen.
“Reverend Worcester will be disappointed to hear that,” Harriet said. She reached out to pat Annabelle’s hand. “But don’t you worry. I’ll intercede for you and smooth things over.”
“Thank you, I think.” Wondering how much the messenger boy had told her hostess, Annabelle felt obliged to add, “Charles has asked me to go through a Cherokee ceremony, as well.”
“Will you?”
“I don’t know. If I could be certain it was his wish, perhaps my decision would be easier.”
“Why would he ask if he didn’t mean it?”
“Out of honor, perhaps. Or a feeling of duty.” Annabelle sighed. “I don’t know. The whole situation is terribly confusing.”
“And you’re too weary at present to think clearly,” Harriet told her. “I understand.”
“I wish I did.”
In spite of all her prior plans to break away, to strike out on her own and put all the disappointments of her past behind her, Annabelle had finally admitted, at least to herself, that leaving Charles was the last thing she wanted to do.
Was that bad? Was it weak to admit that she craved the company of the one man who had treated her like a real lady? Was it foolish to place her trust in anyone, or had she finally found the person with whom she could build a new life?
She wasn’t at all sure.
And she had no idea how to find the answers she sought.
* * *
Because he knew that Annabelle would be worried if he came back alone, Charles did his best to locate the runaway child. It took a while because this was Johnny’s home territory and he had plenty of favorite hiding places.
He was about to give up searching due to the encroaching darkness when he spotted the child hunkered down behind a haystack in the barn.
Instead of berating him, he merely held out his hand and waited for Johnny to take it. “Come on. You can help me check your grandmother’s chickens and see to the other livestock, in case her neighbors haven’t done it yet today.”
“Baby pigs were born after I left,” the boy said sadly. “I saw them.”
Companionable silence reigned as they fed and watered, then rode double to the Boudinot home. The mare and pack mule were already in their barn so he left his horse there, too.
Mounting the porch steps, Charles knocked. A maid wearing a bib apron over her dress answered and led him to where Harriet was seated in a rocking chair, sewing.
At her feet were three well-dressed children: baby William and two young girls in starched, ruffled dresses.
Charles bent and opened his arms.
The girls squealed and rushed to welcome him while Johnny faded into the background. “Eleanor, how you have grown! And Mary, too. Such beautiful young ladies.” Grinning he nodded to their mother and said, “Hello, Harriet,” as his eyes swept the otherwise empty room.
The young matron laughed demurely. “Don’t look so worried. Your wife is upstairs bathing.”
“Good. The journey was wearing on all of us, especially her. We could have ridden a stagecoach part of the time but there were mercenaries, bounty hunters abroad, seeking to do us harm, and we didn’t dare travel in the open.”
Harriet laid aside her needle and thread, taking care to keep them from the baby. “Have they stopped looking for you?”
“I don’t know. We saw no clear signs of pursuit after the first encounter. Now that we are on Cherokee land, we should be safe enough.”
“While we still have land,” Harriet said. She leaned to peer at the boy standing in Charles’s shadow. “I’m relieved to see that you’ve returned with one of our gifts. I had strongly protested the notion of giving away a person in the first place. That is hardly the way to convince Washington that we are civilized.”
“It all worked out for the best,” Charles replied. “If you have no objections, I’ll share a room with Johnny and let Annabelle have private quarters.”
“She has explained a little about your arrangement,” Harriet said. “It is too bad you two cannot exchange letters the way Elias and I did when we were getting to know each other.”
She paused, apparently choosing her words carefully. “Be gentle with her, Charles, and I think all will be well. She is younger than I was when I chose to marry and seems to have been overprotected.”
He nodded. “I suspect it is more a case of neglect than coddling. If it is not too much imposition I would prefer that she stay here with you rather than accompany me when I eventually go to my mother’s.”
That brought a return of Harriet’s smile. “I would not wish a visit to your Sali on my worst enemy. Annabelle may lodge with us for as long as need be. And so may you and the boy, if that’s what you choose.”
“Thank you. I don’t know how long it will take word of my homecoming to reach my mother. Once she hears and returns to New Echota, Johnny and I will probably move in there with her.”
“And leave Annabelle here? A wise decision. She will need to be schooled in the proper way to behave before you expose her to the older, traditional Cherokee women like your mother.”
“I agree. Can I count on you to educate her?”
“As well as I can,” Harriet said, lifting her youngest into her lap and cuddling him. “You are very fortunate that your children will now be considered Cherokee instead of the way it was when the Ridges married a few years ago.”
“We have you and Elias to thank for that, too,” Charles said.
“And the tribal elders.” She patted the baby’s back. “The only natural inheritance I could provide for my children was one that they will find useless as long as we remain among the Cherokee. Now that they can also claim their father’s tribal connections they will be fine.”
Charles understood what she was saying all too well. Since clan membership passed only through the mother’s line, children with non-Indian mothers had been considered nobodies. Without a clan and therefore without identity. But all that had recently changed, much to the relief of John Ridge, Major Ridge’s son, who had married Sarah Northrop, and, of course, Elias and Harriet Boudinot.
What about his future children—if there were any? Charles wondered at this point if he should even think about offspring. He saw himself as fully wed but his bride did not seem to share his views.
They had both sworn in front of their Christian God to be faithful, to love and honor each other. What kind of future could either of them expect if they chose to dishonor those vows?
More than that, Charles concluded soberly, if Annabelle decided to leave him, to go her own way, would he ever be able to feel whole again?
Yes, he had his tribe, his kin, his Cherokee heritage. Yet when he pictured himself without the wife he already loved with all his heart, he felt totally alone.
Understanding dawned. That was exactly the way Johnny must currently be feeling.
Although his prayers for the love of his wife had not been answered the way he had hoped, it looked as if his pleas for the boy’s sake were starting to have an effect.
He and Johnny were more alike than he had thought. Both craved love and acceptance.
And both were unsure of where to find it. Or how to keep it from vanishing like a will-o’-the-wisp.
Chapter Seventeen
The light cotton frock one of Harriet’s maids had laid out for Annabelle while she was bathing was much nicer than she had expected—so lovely she was hesitant to wear it. It was a pale-blue-and-indigo-gingham print with piped bodice seams and very loose sleeves gathered into cuffs at the wrists. There was a matching belt that fit her so perfectly, even without a corset, that she was amazed. The separate collar was ample enough to almost form a cape and was fastened at the front of the neck with pins and a blue satin bow.
“Thank you. I can dress myself,” Annabelle told the wiry, middle-aged maid.
“Yes, ma’am. I’ve unpacked for you.”
“There was little left in my valise that did not need washing, I’m afraid.”
“Where shall I put the doll?” the maid asked, cradling it as if it were a real baby.
“Just lay it on the bed.”
“Yes’m.”
Standing there in a clean chemise after the maid left, Annabelle marveled at the gown she had been given to wear. The Boudinots must be quite wealthy if this garment was any indication. Come to think of it, Harriet and the children were also clad lavishly, particularly since they lived on what Annabelle considered the frontier.
Growing up in rural Tennessee, she had taken Eaton’s farmland and servants for granted, only learning how rich he was compared to others after they’d taken up residence in the Capitol.
The differences in status there, however, had not been nearly the shock that seeing this Cherokee civilization was. These Indians had modern homes and servants and all the refinements she had noticed in Washington City. They were, for all their strangeness of speech and custom, very like the privileged classes of people among which she had grown up.
She slipped the dress over her head and threaded her arms into the sleeves as she continued to ponder. Where she had expected to encounter simple country folk, she’d found culture and elegance.
That discovery might have suited most women but realizing what it meant made Annabelle tremble. If she stayed, if Charles still wanted her, he would have to make allowances for her sketchy background. It was obvious that the Cherokees held great store by their ancestry. And hers was beyond unknown. She had been a homeless, orphaned waif when Myra Eaton had taken her in all those years ago.
Her Cherokee Groom Page 16
